Carnegie eyed Luc, she felt torn between compliment and insult. In the end, she shrugged it off. Even Marcus had expressed his like. She smiled to herself. She looked up at the exchange between the two men. She wanted to add that Marcus would probably be the most likely candidate to get hurt again anyways and so would need it the most, but she didn't dare.

Instead, she turned to Luc. "Ehrm. What was that thing that gone exploded anyways? Did anyone bother to check what it was?" Anya nodded her agreement at the question.

Luc sighed at the stubbornness of his friend and left the stimpack with Marcus; whether he used it or not was up to the big man: he could nit force him (Marcus would snap him like a twig if he tried!)

To Carnegie he shrugged, "D'no Carny; all I know is I'm not going back in there to find out! That Fu... Er, that house could drop any second!" Luc dropped his bowl down to Elvis to let him lick it, "alright, I'm gonna grab some shut-eye. Ah, but first...!" The man pulled a satchel out of his bag - inside it were caltrops. He didnt have enough to circle the whole area but he placed them in what he thought would be likely spots of entry to the small camp they had made. "Now," he said as he finished, "I think we should all try and catch some sleep" he looked pointedly at Marcus.

Kreadle looked at Luc, "We're not inside the fort here - we'll need to take watches, unless you want to wake up with those coyotes munching our throats. I'll take first watch if you want."

A loud creak, followed by the sound of wood tearing, and a small wall of noise announced the nearby house's final demise. A large cloud of dust came billowing up. Then everything was still, save for small sounds of debris settling.

Carnegie shared a look with Anya. So much for checking the house. She gathered the dishes and cutlery and went to the nearest stream to clean them out. When she came back, she did some basic gun maintenance, loaded it anew in case she would need it and then settled in her sleeping bag. Elvis came and curled up next to her as the rest of the camp prepared themselves for the night.

Marcus flinched as the house collapsed for its final time. He strolled over to the crater filled with debris and burnt planks. He looked at it for a moment, melancholy, and then began to set up his tent. Afterward, be contemplated using the stimpack. If he did use it, he'd be able to kill things for longer. If he didn't, then they'd have the stimpack in case one of them got seriously injured beyond the petty scratches he all ready had.

He sighed heavily. As the incident with the house proved, Luc was probably smarter than he was. And as they'd still have another stimpack for possible injuries. It was time to swallow his stubborness. He examined the directions for the moment, and then began applying the stimpack

The instructions were very simple. A protective plastic cover on the tip of the device was to be removed, and the tip was to be pushed in near the point of injury.

He noticed there were numbers and letters on it that may signify a date or something - EXP DEC 11 2034 as he pushed on the device. A sudden snap of a spring shot the stimpacks payload into his bloodstream, and along with it sudden burning agony. His heartrate spiked hard and his vision was distorted slightly with each heartbeat.

He felt the substance circulate in his blood and quickly settle at the point of his injuries, where if anything the pain grew more intense. However, to his amazement, pale skin began to form over the wounds, as though invisible spiders were spinning a web.

7 hp restored. A feeling of tiredness and residual pain

Shortly thereafter his heart-rate returned to normal and his vision no longer was messed up.

Luc shuddered at the sound of the house collapsing but resisted making any further jibes Marcus's way - the man had walked away from an explosion! He didnt need any more 'told you so's'. "You're right, Kreadle. I'll take second."

With that, Luc unrolled his bedroll and climbed inside.

Luc is a bit wary of Kreadle. Because of this, he plans to feign sleeping through Kreadle's watch and watch him. After that, he will do his watch and them have solid sleep through the final 3 watches (hopefully!)

Shuddering from the aftereffects of the stimpack, and promising himself that he would never, ever, do that again, Marcus strolled over to the medipack and gently dropped the used stimpack in. He then claimed third watch for himself, before settling in his tent. He pondered his journal for a moment, and then decided he'd do it during his watch.

Marcus quickly fell asleep that night, with dreams of explosions echoing across his eyelids.

While the others were getting settled in their beds, Kreadle moved over to the fallen house and pulled a number of boards out of the wreckage to keep feeding the fire.

Once they settled in, Kreadle sat quietly, and then fished some type of cigarette from inside his jacket. He lit it from an ember, the light on his face looking odd from the underlighting. He then took out his weapons and began to clean them.

Luc had nearly drifted off before Kreadle got up and nudged him 'awake'. "A whole lotta nothin'. Figured the coyote's might of howled tonight. Might be too early though. I suspect somethin' might come sniffing after all the blood here tonight."

With that, Kreadle got his bedrollout and went to sleep. "Nighty night."

"Sleep tight." Luc nodded at Kreadle's report and pushed himself up for his turn at watch. He sat where Kreadle had been and listened intently into the night for unfamiliar sounds. Luc fed the fire from time to time with some spare planks of wood that kreadle had collected, and he nirsed his crossbow on his lap.

Some time later, Carnegie roused. At first, she lay looking up into the endless night sky, then her gaze fell on Luc sitting alone by the fire. She took her rifle and got up. She went to sit down by the fire with him. "Hey." She whispered. "Seen anything?" She looked around, trying to pierce the darkness with her eagle-eyes.

Idly prodding at the fire, Luc drifted into silence. It had been a pretty exciting day, from coyotes to beetles to explosions. He was silently wishing for a calm night, but things were almost too calm for him - he was on edge, waiting for something to go wrong!

"Don't bother, I'm already up so I might as well take the next watch." She looked at the sky again. "Sure is pretty out tonite, huh?" She gave Luc a warm smile. "It's almost like today never happened. More excitement than I've seen in a while though. Not that I'm complainin...I mean I...it's fun havin some company fer a change, usually it's juss me huntin on my own, well juss me an Elvis...and..." She trailed off.

Carnegie almost groaned, he already knew all this. She wasn't good at these sort of things. Then a thought hit her.

"Hey, uh. Didn't yer crossbow break? Did you fix it, or? I'm better with guns, but I could prolly take a look at it, if'n you want..."She glanced at him shyly then looked promptly at the fire, trying to seem disinterested of his answer.

Out of the corner of his eye, Luc caught movement. Turning, he saw an odd sight. A small pinpoint of red light high in the sky. Not a star - he had never seen a star that shade of red, and he knew most of them.

And this one was moving. Not fast - it was drifting slowly across the sky in the direction of Stonehammer.

"Yeah, sure Carny, it would be great if you could check it out for me!" Luc handed his crossbow over eagerly, and peered up to the skies as directed, "Yeah, real pretty night; can see the stars really... Hrm." Luc paused, confused as he spotted the red, moving light.

"That's odd - you see that one up there?" Luc directed Carnegie's eyes to the moving light, "That doesn't look like a star. What do you suppose..." leaping to his feet, Luc gasped dramatically and nudged Carnegie, "I know what it is, Carnie!" Luc paused for effect, then burst out, "Aliens! They've finally come to take you home!"Luc burst out in a stifled laughter at his own joke, trying not to rouse the others.

Carnegie took the crossbow with a smile, then looked up with confusion. True, that was no star...what could it- Carnegie froze when she heard the "joke". Was that what he thought of her? Was she so akward that she was like an alien to him? She looked down, biting back bitter tears of anger. She threw the crossbow onto the fire! "That's good fer nothin' but kindlin!" She exclaimed and stormed off, striding straight into the woods.

Luc actually yelped as Carnegie threw his broken crossbow in the fire and stormed off. He jumped forth to grab the crossbow, them hesitated, taking a step in the direction that Carnegie went. Then he stopped and rubbed his head, "What the sweet @!#$ just happened!?" should he stay and give her space, or go after her? Why were women so god-d**ned temperamental? Huffing, luc sat back down at the fire and grumbled to himself. If he explored the world for a thousand years and unlocked the secrets all the lands had to offer, he would still not know why women acted in the manner they did. She was like a little sister to him; hopefully she still thought of him as a brother...

Luc cursed then stood, giving Marcus a boot - perhaps a little harder than necessary. "You're up for watch, Mark. Carnie's gone off in the woods but. Im sure she hasn't gone far: she'll no doubt be bac k soon."

Through her tears and darkness, Carnegie could barely see a thing. Branches and twigs made her travel painful, and noisy.Very quickly her foot stepped on something much softer then she expected. She nearly tripped over a carcass of something - her nose told her that much.

Carnegie kept gasping for air between violent sobs as she barged through the woods. She broke off a branch and started swatting all around with it, as she stumbled on. After a while, she had almost run out of tears. She wiped her face on her sleeve. She must look awful, she thought. She wasn't one of those girls who could cry and still look pretty, her face got all red and blotchy, almost as if she was allergic to her own tears. I'm an idiot, she thought. No! HE's the idiot! He keeps treatin' me like I'm one of his..his..stupid drinkin' buddies, she grumbled. She sighed and walked on in silence for a while, starting to regret having stormed off, it was gonna be hard returning after that. Where was she anyways?

And that's when her boot squelched on something moist. What the...? She thought, and snapped back to her senses. A carcass could mean something was close by. She readied her rifle and hunched down, scanning the surrounding area for movement. Maybe she was an idiot after all...

Perception check to check my surroundings, +6.Stealth to keep quiet(although that's probably pointless by now :p ) +10.Survival check to see what kind of tracks surround the carcass,+7 and how fresh it is, +6.Nature to see what kind of animal it was that got killed, +5.And finally I ready an action to shoot anything hostile coming at me.

Carnegie surveyed the scene as close as she dared while keeping on the lookout for anything moving. The kill was fresh, that didn't make her feel any better. Only coyote tracks though, were they killin' their own now? Perhaps a rivaling pack, or those bigger mutated ones were behind this. In either case, it was nothing she couldn't handle. Even the biggest ones had gone down in one shot afore. Still, she supposed she would have to swallow her pride and return to camp sooner or later.

She slowly began backtracking, eyes nd ears wide and head scanning her surroundings, she followed her own all too obvious trail heading back to camp.